He didn't notice anything different at first and thought he'd failed to enter his soul, then he noticed that the System was still showing him the world around his head because it didn't move when he moved his head. He decided to keep the entrance of the Dungeon in view for now, but corrected the mistake he'd originally made when customizing his HUD to correctly show him the inside of his soul.

So, let's see. What new Skills do I need? I need some real damage. A passive that makes deal damage equal to, say, one second of Health regeneration, plus 1% HP would be good, considering how fast fights go. Let's just put in very high numbers and let the System figure out what's balanced, since that's apparently how it works or something. For visuals, let's go with the blessing of a loli.

Skill granted:

Loli's Blessing lv1

Next would be what? Even more damage, more tankiness? I'll basically have 1v1 DR covered with MoA, but that does not have the 'unignorable' or 'unbypassable' tags like Force Barrier of the Lolicon does. FBotL? Sounds kinda like a swear jar. Or maybe cum jar, ew. Anyway. Don't know how you'd 'bypass' something like that kind of DR, but DR ignore is going to be a pain. Literally, if I ever add back pain receptors.

Anyway, more damage or more tankiness? At minimum, I kill people in, what... 40k hits, assuming no DR? That's forever, but not impossible. Some DR ignore would probably be good. Maybe. Turning my DR into unignorable DR would also be nice. Assuming condensed armor as baseline DR, that's 75% DR I'd need to be able to ignore. Though, I guess PB will deal with that, if slowly.

Gosh dang, this is a hard decision. Heck, up- well, maybe not with the skill cap. Going for some effect that doesn't eventually get cut off like skill experience does would be important. So, one skill for DR ignore, one for making DR unignorable, and one undecided. Let's go ahead and figure out images for the two DR skills and then work on the last one.

Skill granted:

Lolicon's Righteous Retribution lvX

Skill granted:

Tenacity of the Lolicon lvX

A transportation skill would be nice, especially if I can take others with me, but that'll be kinda useless once I figure out true Flash again, which I should probably work on here. Not sure if it'll work while in my soul, but we'll see. Heck, I could maybe even make my last class skill Flash. Heck, it could even make Flash the level 80 class skill for all future Lolicoknights, if that's how this's working.

Not sure if that's a good idea, though. Would definitely make people take Lolicoknight just for that skill and no fake Lolicoknights allowed. It also already has Lolicon's Fervent Support for some movement, though never enough. So, blah. Somehow getting a permanent buff from lolis would be nice. Apparently system skills are a thing, I could go for one as the level 80 skill.

Not sure what I'd do with them, though, and LFV is basically already a permanent buff with a generic task like "don't die." And I forgot to incorporate LFV's and Awareness's DR into the damage calculation from before so the guard's attacks hit even harder than I calculated. Anyway. I think I'm good on DR now. More regen? Like, +5% total Health regeneration for each loli who has knighted you or something?

Could be task-based. "Gain a permanent increase to percent total Health regeneration when you complete a task given by a loli," or something. The system would probably base it off difficulty or something. That's basically just quests, though, which already exist. So... I guess I could just have "Aura of the Lolicon." Have it be like, "Calm and comfort all nearby lolis. Those who wish to harm, plan on harming, or have harmed at least one loli have heavily reduced stats while in the aura."

Skill Granted!

Aura of the Lolicon lv1

Wow. Well, I guess combined with LRR, I'm going to obliterate the king in like 2 hits.

Then he went to work.

Vigorous 1200/1200

Congratulations! You have completed the Vigorous Path!

Vital Soak lv1

33 Vitality per Level

1 Bonus Health Regeneration per Level

1 Bonus Stamina Regeneration per Level

Life Blooming 1200/1200

Congratulations! You have completed the Life Blooming Path!

Life Garden lvX

34 Bonus Health Regeneration per Level

1 Bonus Stamina Regeneration per Level

Vibrant Vital Dynamo 1650/1650

Congratulations! You have completed the Vibrant Vital Dynamo Path!

Everlasting Dynamo lv1

38 Vitality per Level

6 Bonus Health Regeneration per Level

1 Bonus Stamina Regeneration per Level

100 Health Regeneration per Level

100 Stamina Regeneration per Level

100 Mana Regeneration per Level

Well of Bottomless Health 1650/1650

Congratulations! You have completed the Well of Bottomless Health Path!

105 Vitality per Level

6 Bonus Health Regeneration per Level

1 Bonus Stamina Regeneration per Level

100 Health Regeneration per Level

100 Stamina Regeneration per Level

100 Mana Regeneration per Level

Sea of Health 2200/2200

Congratulations! You have completed the Sea of Health Path!

Vital Presence upgraded

38 Vitality per Level

6 Bonus Health Regeneration per Level

1 Bonus Stamina Regeneration per Level

100 Health Regeneration per Level

100 Stamina Regeneration per Level

100 Mana Regeneration per Level

Unparalleled Vitality 2200/2200

Congratulations! You have completed the Unparalleled Vitality Path!

All for One (Vitality) lvX

38 Vitality per Level

6 Bonus Health Regeneration per Level

1 Bonus Stamina Regeneration per Level

100 Health Regeneration per Level

100 Stamina Regeneration per Level

100 Mana Regeneration per Level

Holy cow that took forever. Ok, no way am I getting another Path at this slow rate of acquiring PP, especially without that Path having provided an active skill. That alone took me almost 3 months in here. I have no idea how long it's been outside. I'm at a what, 5000 times time compression? 5 from the dungeon and 1000 from soul exploration? I'm not doing math, but that's still at most minutes out there.

Let's work on getting Immortal Troll out of his humble beginnings and into the real world. He's already come back from the dead for the first time by this point, I'd say it's time the System appreciates he's out of the prologue.

First, despite what Melena said about Patrons and how they used their images, Degritone worked on being able to bring the entirety of his image to the front of his mind at once until he could materialize the full Immortal Troll, relatively newly blackened hands and newly magical blood included. Then, he worked on nailing down the specific minute details so they stopped fluctuating between different materializations.

While he knew what advancing to a tier 2 image needed, he was unsure of how to proceed in evolving an image for simply stronger Skills. With Melena's advice months away if he were to try to ask, he proceeded in the way he felt correct: Deepening the lore of the Skills. How he used his magical blood after getting it, how his new hands affect his daily life and combat, etc..

His first thought was to add more lore-relevant details, but he figured those may become Skills, depending on what he added, so he decided on deepening the lore of existing Skills, instead. After a few days spent writing out a short story, then another month of reading and rereading that story so he could internalize the information and call it up at a moment's notice alongside his Immortal Troll, he finally got some confirmation that he was correct.

Congratulations! Skill Set upgraded!

Beginnings of the Immortal Troll becomes Revelation of the Immortal Troll

Immortal Flesh becomes Battered Flesh of the Immortal

Prodigious Regeneration becomes Exemplar Regeneration

Withering Hands becomes Withered Hands

Penetrative Blood becomes Piercing Blood

Well, my creativity's sapped for a good while. I was hoping to do more, but meh. Let's just grind skills until someone gets here, friend or foe.

Vital Abyss 1521/2200

Finally, after over a year total of grinding Skills, Degritone got a visitor, and it wasn't another Degritone. I really should have worked on my image more. I didn't think it would take that long. I should have actually done some math to figure out how long I had, then known I actually had time to work on Flash. Oh, well. Way too late now and I hope I never have to do this again. 100% going to see if Melena's open for cuddles after this because holy cow.

He looked over his gains before returning to the real world to meet his new guest.

Summon Ally lvX

Block lv350

Empower lv1329

Mana Manipulation lv19

Mana Weapon lv1165

Mana Armor lv350

Guard lv1198

Rapid Cell Division lvX

Pacifist lv214

Revitalize lv1187

Haste lv425

Orbs of Revitalization lv456

Revitalizing Aura lv484

Energize lv173

Tough Skin lv349

Mark of Antipathy lvX

Bastion lv133

Summon Ghoul lv1

Requiem of the Gravedigger lv1302

Unholy Covenant

Omen of War

Omen of Pestilence

Omen of Famine

Swordsman's Territory lv1196

Knight's Awareness lvX

Knockback Resistance lvX

Recuperate lv382

Juggernaut's Might lvX

Vital Presence lv379

Potent Vitality lvX

As Old, Now New lvX

Aura Manipulation lv215

Bloody Aura lv425

Acidic Blood lvX

Sense Lolis lvX

Lolicon's Fervent Support lv425

Permanent Prosperity lv469

Adaptive Palisade lv335

Exotic Nervous System lv405

Being of Vitality lvX

Revelation of the Immortal Troll lv616

Battered Flesh of the Immortal

Exemplar Regeneration

Withered Hands

Piercing Blood

Force Barrier of the Lolicon lv332

Loli's Blessing lv332

Lolicon's Righteous Retribution lvX

Tenacity of the Lolicon lvX

Aura of the Lolicon lv337

Vital Soak lv316

Life Garden lvX

Everlasting Dynamo lv295

All for One (Vitality) lvX

Name Degritone Race Human Resources 11199693.637.../11199693.637... (+86859402.979...) 2397961.673.../2397961.673... (+157634524.891...) 3856696.386.../3856696.386... (+90802802.164...) Class The Lolicoknight lv88 Experience 26072/391600 Strength 7737 Endurance 12687 Vitality 276996 Agility 2033 Physical 6073 Magic 6966